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AEW superstar Chris Jericho shared a story on the latest edition of his Talk is Jericho podcast about an encounter he had with WWE executives at a toy fair sometime last year, when the Demo God was representing his new promotion along with the likes of Kenny Omega, the Young Bucks, and other AEW talent.
Jericho says AEW had a huge display for their Unrivaled Action figures at the fair, and he was attempting to check out the WWE display, something that didn’t go as smoothly as Le Champion was hoping.
“Talking about about the Toy Fair, we, being AEW, had a really big display in the back of the convention center,” Jericho recalled. “I was there. Kenny [Omega] was there. Cody [Rhodes], Hangman [Page], The Bucks, I remember Luchasaurus and Jungle Boy. We had kind of our A crew was there. It was so funny. Typical WWE bulls**t, they wouldn’t let us up there to see their display, and so one of the guys let me in. And then I was filming something.”
Jericho says he was reprimanded for attempting to film, and later calls WWE’s display lame for it being such a big toy fair in New York.
“He goes, ‘You can’t film.’ I go, ‘Why?’ He goes, ‘Because I’ll get in trouble if they know you’re up here.’ I’m like, ‘I’ve made these guy f**king 200 Chris Jericho WWE action figures! And I can’t come look at your display?’ But their display was in the back of the room in a corner. They had nobody there. None of the talent was there and I thought, this is pretty lame in comparison to what AEW has, which really surprised me especially at the Toy Fair in New York City.”
Jericho’s guest, toymaker Jeremy Padawer later added that he assumed WWE didn’t want anything leaked with possible film footage.
“Frankly speaking, the way AEW was put together, it was put together like a community,” Padawer described. “It was put together like a whole positive culture. This whole feel came from the very beginning. So I think that over time, what happens is, you come to realize that these action figures, they have some value in terms of you don’t want the leak to get out. You don’t want the wrong photo to get out at the wrong time, but I think it’s two things. One, culture, you guys are setting an amazing culture, and two, probably there’s some pragmatic stuff going on where there’s timing about whether they want something to be launched.”
You can check out the latest Talk Is Jericho here. (Thanks to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription)